John Sjölander

My thoughts on Technology, Startups, Business and this thing we call the Internet.
My personal blog can be found here.

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COO Survey

Inspired by Second Life founder Philip Rosedale (foundation interview), once every other month, I send a company wide “COO survey”.

It consists of three simple questions: “Do you want to keep my as COO?”, “Am I getting better at my work?”, and “Why?”.

I use Survey Monkey to collect anonymous answers.

Once every other month I get some very sobering responses. The answers are both inspiringly uplifting, as they are brutally honest. But I’m thankful for it, and it’s an important source for inspiration in becoming better at my work.

I only read those answers at the end of the day. Chances are I’ll be both delighted and bummed out. But always humbled.

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Those who count on quote ‘Hollywood’ for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who’s going to stand up for them when their job is at stake. Don’t ask me to write a check for you when you think your job is at risk and then don’t pay any attention to me when my job is at stake,
— MPAA Directly & Publicly Threatens Politicians Who Aren’t Corrupt Enough To Stay Bought | Techdirt
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Link: Startups Use Four Catalysts to Win Funding: Benjamin L. Hallen - Bloomberg

Interesting tips on gaming fund raising.
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What I do know is this: it would be good if more women see interesting opportunities that they might not be qualified for, opportunities which they might in fact fuck up if they try to take them on, and then try to take them on. It would be good if more women got in the habit of raising their hands and saying “I can do that. Sign me up. My work is awesome,” no matter how many people that behavior upsets.
— A Rant About Women « Clay Shirky
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Amazon didn’t create publishing’s woes, any more than blogging created the challenges of newspapers. The company is just cleverly exploiting them.

And good for them. My hope is disgruntled publishing executives like the one above will quit their comfortable jobs at dysfunctional prehistoric companies and start innovating on the model. I don’t believe the public only wants books written by over-tanned drunks who go clubbing anymore than blog readers only want slideshows and posts on Apple.

— Confessions of a Publisher: “We’re in Amazon’s Sights and They’re Going to Kill Us” | PandoDaily
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The more value that employees give a company, the more the employer should be willing to reward them back. Many of the best employers have already figured this out or are starting to. When you have great people and they’re doing great work, you have to incentivize them and make them feel good about going above and beyond.
— Google Recruiter Mike Junge on Startups, the Biggest Mistake Job Applicants Make, and Why It Pays to be Nice
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Link: This is why I don't give you a job

Under these circumstances - I hope it’s understandable - I don’t feel a strong urge to sell my apartment and invest the money into a new company. But for 4 reasons I will definitely not do it.

Why taxes and corruption is complicated for business.
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Entrepreneurship is the pursuit of opportunity without regard to resources currently controlled.
— What’s an Entrepreneur? The Best Answer Ever | Inc.com
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Link: How Larry Page Changed Meetings At Google After Taking Over Last Spring

  • Every meeting must have one clear decision maker. If there’s no decision maker — or no decision to be made — the meeting shouldn’t happen. 
  • No more than 10 people should attend. 
  • Every person should give input, otherwise they shouldn’t be there. 
  • No decision should ever wait for a meeting. If a meeting absolutely has to happen before a decision should be made, then the meeting should be scheduled immediately.
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Link: Who Needs Process?

Software development methodology is organizational Valtrex. Sure, it treats a symptom, but the only cure for the underlying disease is to never have contracted it in the first place. This is not to say that process and methodology are bad. They are means to an end. But the ability of your team to execute on a goal is inversely proportional to the amount of process you have in place. It’s not a direct correlation, though. The underlying cause is that the variance of developer skill on your team is too high, which means your team can’t execute well, and you need process to wrangle the laggards.
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On the face of it, shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world. Shareholder value is a result, not a strategy. … Your main constituencies are your employees, your customers and your products.
— Jack Welch

(Source: excellencenow.com)

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(Source: maryrevolution, via absolutelymadness)

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There is absolutely nothing that beats hard work. You hoped when you were coming out of college that you were the smartest. It turned out none of us are. But I could sure outwork a lot of folks.
— Wall Street Journal asks banking superstar Sallie Krawcheck for her “secret of success”: 

(Source: excellencenow.com)

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In contrast to search, social networking advertising is like hanging signs on the walls of a house during a party and sending sales reps to mingle with the crowd.
— Like Hell Facebook Is Killing Google
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Most companies (98 %) in the world (even tech startups) should be very profit focused. Being profitable allows you degrees of freedom you don’t have when you rely upon other people’s money.
- You may have leverage when you DO need to fund raise. (There are many investors who are not looking to build enormous businesses who value the fact that you can run a business profitably)
- It allows you many more exit opportunities. While Google and Facebook will buy “acquihires” (at least as of Dec 2011), many acquirers hate the idea of buying companies that aren’t profitable. When they look at buying your company they often think in terms of “how long will it take until I earn back the profits to pay for my acquisition price?” If you’re not profitable you’re purely a cost center to them.
- Being profitable certainly makes your company more sustainable in difficult times.

The characteristics of somebody who should NOT focus on profitability include those who:
- Have or perceive that they have the opportunity to build an immensely scalable businesses. Internet scale.
- Have easy access to capital by investors who are committed to building businesses at Interent scale

— Should Startups Focus on Profitability or Not?
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